


Day 2

by MayWritesSometimes



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-17
Updated: 2019-09-17
Packaged: 2020-10-20 17:01:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20678834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MayWritesSometimes/pseuds/MayWritesSometimes
Summary: Post KH3, Terra is doing some hard thinking and introspection, trying to figure what it means to be strong and what makes a master.





	Day 2

**Author's Note:**

> I did this for Terraqua week 2019, day 2, and I wrote it in one go, which is pretty rare.
> 
> I hope it's as fun to read as it was to write!

One day, when he was ten, Terra decided he was grown enough to be a master. 

It was presumptuous, naive and quite stupid overall, but that's not the kind of things one might consider when ten. He could summon the keyblade and knew all the moves, barely made mistakes with his feet placement anymore and even though Aqua was faster, he was much stronger than her. So he had to be ready to be a master. 

Master Eraqus did not share his opinion, and laconically repeated that it was not yet time. So Terra concluded that he had to show his master that he was, actually, ready. He devised a clever plan, and prepared to show that he could do anything his master could. 

What would be more convincing than a show of strength? After all, adults were adults because they were stronger. So Terra had to show he was every bit as strong as any adult, and he could be a master. 

Master Eraqus had planned a trek up the mountains, and Terra filled his bag with stones to make it as heavy as possible. Aqua kept eying him strangely, but she didn't say anything. They walked, up the mountain, and Terra didn't complain, or whine, or even slow down. He was as strong as a master. 

They stopped at the top for lunch and a training session, and Terra was sloppier than usual, slow and imprecise, his muscles aching. Master Eraqus asked him why, but Terra refused to say. If he could just pull through, that would show everyone. 

As the sun began its slow descent through the sky, master Eraqus called it a day, rounded them up and started the journey back. Terra shouldered his bag full of stones without a word. He knew by then already that he had not been strong enough to be a master, that he should have been able to carry the bag up and fight perfectly, but it was a question of pride. He wasn't about to empty it now, he would carry it all back, and next time, next time he would be strong enough. 

The mountain walk was tricky in places, with stones rolling under foot, and the flat way to walk on narrow, between the hard rocks and a steep fall into the forest. They trekked up and down often, enough so that it wasn't a problem anymore, but Terra was tired, his legs shaking, his footing uncertain. While navigating one of the narrowest places, he tripped, and the weight of his bag tipped him to the side, into nothingness. 

\- Terra! 

Aqua grasped his wrist and swung him back, slamming him into the hard rock wall on the other side. He crashed, the bag weight pressing into his back, pain exploding through his body. 

\- Aqua! 

Master Eraqus voice. Terra picked himself up and turned, just in time to see his master grabbing Aqua as she held onto a rock at the edge of the way. She had used Terra's momentum to get him back on the track, but his weight had thrown her off. 

Terra had apologized to them both. He had to be much stronger if he ever wanted to be a master. 

***

When he was fourteen, Terra hit a growth spurt. He took it as sign, that this was it, he was finally becoming an adult, a strong adult, one that could become a master. He was not quite as naive anymore, and was more careful this time. Only master Eraqus could decide whether he was ready or not. He took up to training extra hours, on his own, and Aqua tried to tag along. She wasn't as strong, or endurant, and her trying to keep up with him was honestly quite annoying. Terra liked her too much to say so, but he did get a bit short tempered with her when he was trying to push himself and he felt like she was slowing him down. 

Some of it might have been more insidious than he thought back then, now that he's thinking back on it. His need to show Aqua that she couldn't keep up, however hard she tried. It was about that time that Aqua picked up magic, after all, and it came so naturally to her, while Terra struggled to get anything to work, even the easiest fire spell, that he might have compensated that way. Of course, it wasn't quite a conscious effort on his part, and if Aqua understood, she never said anything, but she did look at him with sad puppy eyes more and more as she walked after him to the training grounds, ran lap after lap around the castle and struggled for his sake. 

Back then, he only thought she was annoying. Trying to be as good as him, when she so clearly wasn't strong. He found some twisted pleasure in showing her her failings, but never got more than a frown for it, and then she would try harder, try again, refuse to give up. That stubbornness Terra understood better than words, and so he kept tolerating her by his side day after day. As long as she tried to be strong. 

The same causes will always produce the same results, and only fools believe otherwise. For most of his life, he thinks, Terra has been a fool, pursuing strength and strength alone, failing to understand how he kept causing harm to those he cared about.

During one of their after training session, a day that Aqua had been particularly brilliant at magic, master Eraqus pushing her further and further until she had successfully covered the whole room with a thunder spell, Terra felt the need to push her around. He proposed a sparring, to which she agreed, eager, and they went outside to train. Master Eraqus disliked them sparring with their keyblades, encouraging them to use the training ones made of wood, as if they were babies. Terra found a nice spot outside, a bit up in the forest, in a slopey clearing, and they sparred. 

He had known how tired Aqua was. He had seen her spend all her energy in spells. He hadn't cared then, because if she spent herself on magic, then she couldn't be strong, and she deserved to see it, she needed to recognize that Terra was the strongest of them both. So he pushed, holding none of his attacks back, one brutal strike after another. Usually, Aqua avoided. But she was tired, slower, and had to parry, which he knew rattled her bones, tiring her muscles, until she wasn't fast enough, panicked and tried to dodge. 

To this day, Terra knows he would have stilled his blade. He might have been young and angry and stupid and jealous and annoyed, he would never willingly hurt Aqua, ever. He would have stopped his strike just a hair short of her face, perfectly in control, and been happy to stop there, offering her his hand to get back on her feet. But he had been so off with her, so distant, that she didn't trust him to stop and plunged to the side instead, rolling on the ground. Badly rolling. She hit her knee hard on a stone, and screamed out in pain. 

\- Aqua! 

Both keyblades instantly vanished as he lunged after her, kneeling to her side. He patted his pockets for a healing potion, but of course he forgot them. Usually, Aqua could have healed herself, but she was spent and had no magic left in her for such a demanding spell. 

\- Can you stand? 

He offered her his hands, and she tried, but her knee buckled under her and she fell face first. He grabbed her before she could hurt herself more. 

He could have slung her arm around his shoulders and helped her walk back, but he didn't. He always thought it was because he felt guilty that she hurt herself. Today, as the scene plays back in his mind, his eyes fixed on the ceiling, Terra suspects it was never the only reason he chose to carry her all the way back. 

Master Eraqus had been furious with them, and it had been months before they had any unsupervised free time again. To go outside the castle to fight one another with their keyblades, after a long day of training, could they think of nothing else to do with their time? 

Aqua had been sheepish about the whole incident, and instead of trailing after Terra every day, she picked up baking and cooking. Terra had seen it as a confirmation that he was the strongest of them both. He carried on. 

***

He was sixteen when they talked about it for the first time. Aqua was growing out of childhood, and seeking conversations. Somehow Terra didn't think she was so annoying anymore, and one summer night, they walked up the mountain and lied down, looking up at the stars. 

\- Hey Terra. 

\- Mmh? 

\- I want to be a master one day. Go out in the worlds, help people and protect the light. 

\- Yeah. 

\- How do you think it is? 

He thought it had to be epic. Fighting the darkness, being the strongest, traveling the worlds and being a hero. It was everything he ever dreamed of. Everything he had worked so hard for until this day. It had to be soon, he had worked so hard for so long then. 

\- I don't know, she whispered. Aren't we still children? 

\- Maybe you are. I'm basically grown up. 

Aqua laughed, softly. She didn't mean to mock him, he knows now, but then, it stung a bit, that she would see him as a child still, an impetuous one eager to be grown when he could hand her her own butt in battle two times out of three. The third time, she lost her patience and struck him with ice or something. 

\- I know I'll be a master. I'll be the strongest keyblade master you've ever seen. 

\- Okay. Let's be masters together then. 

He had promised. He didn't believe Aqua could be a master at the same time as him, because she was such a baby sometimes, but he had promised anyway. 

As time went by, Terra begun to understand two things. The first was that maybe he would not be a master before Aqua, and the second was that he had to stop underestimating Aqua so much. Both things were linked, and while the first one left a bitter taste in his mouth, the second was what led him to become truly strong. When he understood that Aqua did hold back in fights against him, that he would never catch up with her magic or her speed, that is when he learned how to accept his own shortcomings, and got better. 

Strength was his way. Dealing devastating blows, enduring the fire, ice, thunder, whatever she threw at him, was his style. Learning to respect Aqua's own talents brought them closer together, and earned him her full fury during fights. He went from two win out of three to one out of five, which blew his mind. At first, he could barely see her move. 

But he got stronger. 

As time went, the odds crept back up, he learned to anticipate her, to block, to tire her out, and be efficient with his own attacks. To land them. They both grew stronger, until Terra felt truly ready. 

He didn't stop to understand, back then, that this development was because they grew closer, because he opened up and because she trusted him. That he only got stronger because Aqua showed him how. He did not give it a second thought, focusing only on his own skills, on the learning curve. 

***

Just before Ven showed up in their lives, Terra grew impatient once more. He did not progress as much as he wanted, and instead grew in steadiness. He wasn't happy with it, it felt frustrating. He was young still, had much to learn, wanted to get better, get stronger. 

He concluded that he had learned what he could from training with Aqua, and needed a stronger opponent to keep him on his toes. He went to master Eraqus with his request. Master Eraqus considered him, and agreed to a real sparring match. Terra got his ass kicked. Thoroughly. Then master Eraqus asked if he understood the lesson, and Terra said yes. 

He wasn't strong enough to beat Master Eraqus, or even have him break a sweat. He had to get stronger. 

***

Playing with his gummiphone in the dark, Terra thinks back on all of it. All the times he thought the only answer was brute strength, all the blindness. He is, if anything, determined. 

Strength isn't something one can isolate, take for itself. It is always in relation to something else, and should be applied with purpose. Terra thought the purpose was to fight darkness. But now, playing once again the kingstagram video of Aqua in the realm of darkness, dispelling a gigantic tower of shadows in one quick blow, he can't stop from thinking. If the goal is to fight darkness, why weren't they sent directly there, in its realm, to kick its butt like Aqua does? If darkness is to be fought and destroyed, why are there only seven princesses of heart, why would virtually everyone else have both light and darkness? Why was Ven so hurt by being ripped apart from his darkness that he would have died without Sora? 

Terra is in a good place to understand what surrendering to darkness means. Yet, somethings just don't make sense to him. He hits play again, and watches as Aqua leaps and slashes. He can hear Riku, who filmed it, whistle under his breath. 

Maybe Aqua knows what true strength is. Maybe she can finally show him how to be a master.

**Author's Note:**

> Please let me know if the format is weird or wacky, it's my first post and I'm doing it from my phone, which isn't ideal.
> 
> But more importantly, thank you for reading!


End file.
